Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 14th of June 2018
Case name: 2018_06_14-WM262
Situation: Alarm Phone alerted to three boats in distress between Morocco and Spain, two people remain missing
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Western Mediterranean Sea

Summary of the Case: On Thursday the 14th of June, the Alarm Phone shift team was alerted to three boats in distress in the strait of Gibraltar. Two groups of travellers were rescued by the Moroccan navy, but from the first boat two people who had falled into the water remain missing. The third boat was rescued by a Spanish vessel and brought to Spain.

At 6.49am, the Alarm Phone shift team was alerted by a contact person to a group of 6 travellers who had left from Tangier not long ago. Their boat had flipped over, and they had fallen into the water. Three of them managed to cling on to the back of the rubber boat, and one swum back to the Moroccan shore. We immediately alerted both the Moroccan and Spanish rescue authorites, who were already busy with several other distress cases. The contact person stayed in contact with the travellers who were panicking, but nevertheless managed to send their position. We called back the Spanish Salvamento Maritimo (SM) and passed on the position. At 8.13am we reached the travellers, who told us that they had been rescued by the Moroccan navy. Due to bad connection, however, it was not possible to understand how many of them were rescued.
In the afternoon we learned that only three people had been rescued by the navy, whilst one had managed to swim back to Morocco. Those four were all safe. The two people who had falled into the water remain missing, and we have to fear the worst.

At 09.24am CEST, the Alarm Phone shift team was alerted by a contact person to 4 travellers in distress in the Strait of Gibraltar, forwarding us their phone number and position. The travellers had left from a beach close to Tangier at 3am local time. We tried to call the phone number provided by the contact person, but we were not able to reach the travellers. At 09.30am CEST we called the Spanish search and rescue organisation Salvamento Maritimo (SM) and passed on the information we had. At 09.46am we could see on vesselfinder that one of the search and rescue vessels of SM was right by the position of the travellers. However, the vessel continued north without stopping. At 09.55am we therefore called SM again, but they only informed us that they had handed over the case to the Moroccan Navy. At 10.20am we received a confirmation from the contact person that the travellers had been intercepted by the Moroccan Navy.

At 3.03pm, the Alarm Phone shift team received a direct call from a boat in distress carrying 51 travellers, amongst them 11 women. The travellers had left from Larache on a boat with a motor, but had run out of petrol, and were therefore unable to move on. After this initial call we were not able to get in touch with the travellers again, despite trying constantly for the rest of the evening. At 3.32pm we called the Spanish search and rescue organisation Salvamento Maritimo (SM) and alerted them to the distress of the travellers. During the afternoon and evening, SM was not able to give us updates on the rescue of the travellers when we called them, and neither were the Moroccan rescue authorites. Only at 10.45pm, during another call to SM, did we receive the news that the travellers had been rescued by the Spanish vessel Luz de Mar and were on their way to Spain.